Perfect Writer:1.00:CDP OEM/Lesson/LESSON2.MSS
Text file with Lesson 2 of Perfect Writer tutorial. File content Lesson 2 REVISING TEXT: INSERTING & DELETING In two short lessons you have learned a good deal about Perfect Writer: how to create and print a letter, plus commands for scrolling the screen, finding documents, creating two windows, and quitting Perfect Writer. In this lesson you will learn how to revise text. In doing so, you will see the real power of Perfect Writer. REMEMBER: To scroll this lesson use the `PgUp' and `PgDn' keys located on the number keypad. The first step will be to split the screen into two windows, displaying in the top window the short letter created in Lesson 1 called 'practice.mss'. to the next screen using the `PgDn' Function Key Throughout the lesson you will be working in the top window, following instructions that are displayed in the bottom window. At this time move the cursor to the middle of the screen and give the CREATE TWO WINDOWS Command: CONTROL---X 2 the Ctrl Key and type 'x'. Releasing these, type '2'. The window will immediately divide in half, with the cursor in the top window. To continue, scroll the bottom window using: Ctrl--PgDn View Next Screen (Other Window) Ctrl--PgUp View Previous Screen (Other Window) Now, using the FIND DOCUMENT Command, instruct Perfect Writer to retrieve your practice letter from the diskette on drive B, and display it in the top window. As you recall, when the FIND DOCUMENT Command is given, Perfect Writer responds with the message: "File to find: ". At this point type the file name: "b:practice.mss", where "b:" indicates the drive where the file is located. At this time, with the cursor still in the top window, type the FIND DOCUMENT Command: Control---X Control---F Perfect Writer responds with the message: "File to Find: ". Type: `b:practice.mss', followed by a carriage return. Perfect Writer will retrieve your letter from disk and place it in the top window. It is identified in the Mode Line as `B:PRACTICE.MSS'. REVISING TEXT Now, if you are like most writers, you probably wanted to begin revising your letter the moment you started typing it. If it had been produced on an ordinary typewriter, your only means of revision would be to take pencil (and perhaps scissors and paste) to your paper copy, afterwards re-typing it again. Each time you made a change, you would have to re-type the letter anew. With Perfect Writer, however, all changes are made on the screen where the copy is still `soft', and the words and characters can be moved about wherever you want. MOVING THE CURSOR The first thing you need to know is how to move the cursor, since all changes will be made at the position of the cursor. Perfect Writer provides a number of very versatile and efficient commands for moving the cursor. We will discuss these at length in the next lesson. For the time being, use the four `Arrow Keys' located on the number keypad. These keys will move the cursor in the direction the arrows indicate. If held down, the key function will repeat, skipping the cursor across the screen. Practice moving the cursor around your letter using these arrow keys. When you feel comfortable with them, place the cursor just after the word "Hello!" You are going to insert another sentence after the word "Hello!". It will read: "Hello! You'll never guess what I'm doing!" With the cursor just after "Hello!" begin typing the sentence to be added. (If you make a typing error, use the BACKSPACE Key to erase and re-type.) Notice what happens as you type the new words: Perfect Writer automatically INSERTS the words, pushing all other characters over to make room. There are so many words in the new sentence now that the existing text is pushed completely off the screen and wrapped back in an awkward display. How to fix this? Perfect Writer provides a command called the ADJUST PARAGRAPH Command. Type: Escape. . . Q and release the Escape Key, followed by `q'. Perfect Writer automatically adjusts the paragraph, wrapping and filling all lines. The ADJUST PARAGRAPH Command (Escape. . .Q) is a very handy command for readjusting text on the screen. It only requires that the cursor be somewhere in the paragraph being adjusted. Now change the next sentence. Position the cursor on top of the comma (,) just after "Perfect Writer" in the second line. Type a period after `Writer' to end the sentence. NEXT, type the INSERT Key (labeled `Ins') three times: Ins Ins {the `Ins' stands for insert} Ins As you can see this command inserts blank lines, pushing all text to the right of the cursor down one line at a time, giving you a little `working room' to insert whatever new text you want. This eliminates the annoyance of seeing words pushed ahead of the cursor as you type. Now type the following: "It's really very exciting! Would you like to hear about it?" When you have typed these two new lines, close up the paragraph by giving the CLOSE INSERT Command: Escape. . Control--O the Escape Key; Hold down the Ctrl-key and type the letter o Perfect Writer immediately closes up the lines. This procedure of opening and closing lines is not really necessary, since, as we saw previously, Perfect Writer will push all other text aside when inserting words and characters. But, as mentioned, it is sometimes easier to insert a revision when existing text isn't in the way. DELETING Now, delete the original ending to the old sentence: ", and I thought I would write a short note. . . ." Perfect Writer offers several convenient deletion commands. One of these you already know: the BACKSPACE Key which deletes characters BACKWARDS across a line, one character at a time. Unfortunately, in this instance the cursor is at the beginning of the text to be deleted, and the BACKSPACE Key is not of much use. A delete command you may want to use is the DELETE NEXT CHARACTER Command which deletes characters forward one at a time: Control---D (`D' stands for 'delete'.) Try this command now. Place the cursor on the first character to be deleted, the comma (,), and delete the first three words: " , and thought I. . . ." This command works well enough, but as you see it is SLOW, even for the small amount of deleting you have. Of course, there is a faster way. Perfect Writer provides the DELETE NEXT WORD Command: Escape. . .D This command will delete the next word to the right of the cursor, moving all remaining text on the line to the left. Delete one or two words using this command. (Remember, the Escape Key is not held like the Control Key, but depressed and released.) If you have only a few words to delete, this command is very handy. However, it too can be slow, especially if we have a lot of deleting to do. Perfect Writer provides two commands that will delete a whole line of text at one time. These are: DELETE LINE Control--K (also your `Del' Function Key) DELETE SENTENCE Escape. . .K The first deletes all characters from the position of the cursor to the end of the current LINE. The second deletes all characters from the position of the cursor to the end of the current SENTENCE. If any words still remain to be deleted, use the DELETE SENTENCE Command (Escape. . .K) to get rid of them. This command should delete text until it encounters a period, question mark, exclamation point, or paragraph break. If you need to 'adjust' the paragraph following these deletions, type 'Escape. . .Q'. The YANKBACK Now, let's make a mistake--on purpose! Let's delete a line that we really don't want to delete. Move the cursor to the beginning of the paragraph, just before "Hello!. . ." Type the DELETE LINE Command: Control---K (Or use the `Del' Function Key) On some word processors that line would be gone for good, and if you really hadn't wanted to delete it, you would now have to compose it again from memory. Perfect Writer provides a safeguard against accidental deletions, called the YANKBACK Command. Without moving the cursor type: Control---Y The deleted line is immediately replaced. Do it again, except this time delete two or three lines in a row (using either Control--K or the `Del' Key). Notice the deleting action: first the characters on a line are deleted, followed by the 'line' itself, which causes all subsequent text to be moved up. When the lines are gone, 'yank' them back using Control--Y Perfect Writer TEMPORARILY saves all deletions larger than a single character in a storage area called the 'Save Buffer'. Such deletions can be recalled, as we have just seen, using the YANKBACK Command. But that's not all. Perfect Writer will save consecutive deletions in the order in which they are deleted. We have seen this already, but as a further example, delete the first line of the paragraph by repeatedly issuing the DELETE NEXT WORD Command: Escape. . .D Then, without moving the cursor type the YANKBACK Command: Control---Y All of the words, which were deleted singly, are replaced in their correct order. One important thing to understand about the YANKBACK Command is that it will save only the most RECENT deletion. That is, if you make a deletion, move the cursor, and then make another deletion, Perfect Writer, thinking you don't want the first deletion any longer, DISCARDS it, saving only the second (most recent) deletion that you make. Whenever you make a deletion, a tiny 'plus sign' (+) appears at the right end of the Mode Line. This plus sign means that Perfect Writer is continuing to gather deleted material into the Save Buffer. Moving the cursor will cause this plus sign to disappear--a signal that Perfect Writer has stopped gathering material. Making any other deletions after this plus sign has disappeared will result in the first batch of deletions being LOST! The YANKBACK Command has some very handy applications. In a later lesson we will see how it is used in moving and copying material, not only within a document, but BETWEEN documents. DELETING REGIONS Large, even VERY large, deletions are possible with Perfect Writer. You can delete words and lines,paragraphs, and pages of text in one simple operation. For example, delete the entire paragraph of your letter, and then restore it using the YANKBACK Command. Position the cursor anywhere in the second paragraph, and type the DEFINE PARAGRAPH Command: Escape. . .H Although nothing appears to happen, Perfect Writer has quietly marked the boundaries of the paragraph which the cursor is occupying. You are now ready to delete the paragraph using the WIPE REGION Command: Control---W Perfect Writer 'wipes' the region clean, deleting the defined paragraph. Of course, as with other deletions the region has been saved temporarily in the Save Buffer and can be restored using the YANKBACK Command (Do this now): Control---Y Delete the entire letter. The procedure is slightly different. When an area larger than a paragraph needs to be deleted, You must first manually mark the boundaries of the region to be deleted. Move the cursor to the beginning of the letter using the `Home' Key. Next, type the MARK SET Command: Escape. . . (That is, type the Escape Key followed by the Space Bar.) Perfect Writer responds with the message in the Echo Line: "Mark Set" This means that an invisible mark has been set at the position of the cursor, representing the UPPER boundary of the region to be deleted. Now, move the cursor to the end of the letter, using the `End' key. The new position of the cursor marks the LOWER boundary of the region to be deleted. Type the WIPE REGION Command: Control---W Perfect Writer deletes the letter. Can you call them back using YANKBACK (Control---Y)? Of course! (Do it now.) INSERTING DOCUMENTS Perfect Writer provides a command that allows you to insert another document into the one you are editing. It is called the INSERT DOCUMENT Command and it works very much like the FIND DOCUMENT Command, except that the document you request is actually inserted into the file you are editing, instead of into a separate location in machine memory. Let's see how it works. When you give the INSERT DOCUMENT Command, Perfect Writer will respond with the message "File to Insert : ". Type the name of the file you want to insert, followed by a carriage return. On your Lessons Diskette you have included a small file called "recipe.mss" that will illustrate this command. It is a file that you can insert into your practice letter. Move the cursor to the end of the letter and add the following `postscript': "P.S.: I'm including the recipe for `Flour Cookies' that you asked for last week. Sorry I didn't get it to you earlier." When you have typed these two lines, move the cursor down two or three blank lines, using the CARRIAGE RETURN, and type the INSERT DOCUMENT Command: Control---X I the `Ctrl' Key and type `x'. Releasing these, type `i'. When Perfect Writer responds with the message: `File to Insert : ', type: `b:recipe.mss', followed by a carriage return. Perfect Writer inserts the recipe for `Flour Cookies' into your letter, leaving the cursor positioned at the end of the inserted material. It is important to position the cursor properly before issuing the command, since the insertion will be made EXACTLY at the position of the cursor. The various uses for this command are not difficult to imagine. For example, it is a handy way of creating form letters, in which each letter must be `compiled' out of pre-structured paragraphs and sections. SOME MISCELLANEOUS COMMANDS How many times have you ever typed `beleive' for `believe', or `thsi' for `this'? Transposition of characters is a very common typing error. Usually we discover it only after we`ve gone several lines beyond the word, so that backspacing to erase and retype is impractical. Perfect Writer provides two transposition commands to correct such errors. You'll find yourself using them ALL THE TIME. They are: Control--T Transpose Characters Escape. . .T Transpose Words To use the first, place the cursor on the SECOND of the two characters to be transposed, and type the command. For the second, place the cursor BETWEEN the two words to be transposed, and type the command. Try these commands on various words and characters in your practice letter. UPPERCASING Words and Characters You have probably noticed how a lot of the words in this lesson have been UPPERCASED (for emphasis). There will be many times when, in creating your documents, you will want to change the characters of a word or words into uppercase (or lowercase). Perfect Writer provides several commands for Capitalizing words and changing words to uppercase or lowercase. They are: Escape. . .C Capitalize Word Escape. . .U Uppercase Word Escape. . .L Lowercase Word For each command, place the cursor before the word to be changed and type the command. Practice these commands on words in your practice letter. Notice that following the change, the cursor is placed after the word. SAVING A DOCUMENT When you have finished revising your letter, you may want to print it again, or if not, at least save it to disk. Saving your letter to disk is easy. Again, one command does it. With the cursor still in the top window type the SAVE DOCUMENT Command: Control--X Control--S (Hold the Control Key and type `x' and then `s'.) Perfect Writer immediately copies your letter to disk. During this operation the message "Writing. . ." is briefly displayed in the Echo Line, followed by the message "File Written" when the operation is complete. In this case, your letter has been stored on the diskette in drive 'B' under the name: `practice.mss'. (Perfect Writer automatically adds the `.mss' extension.) You can retrieve it at any time for further revisions and/or printing using this name. (One IMPORTANT note: The SAVE DOCUMENT Command is a very important command, and one that you will want to get in the habit of using at regular intervals while working at the computer--during a pause in your work or ANYTIME you leave the computer. This is important because ACCIDENTS do happen: your child touches the power switch, someone trips over the plug unhooking it from the wall, lightning strikes, shutting off the electricity--the possibilities are endless! When such a thing happens, if only for an instant, everything in machine memory is LOST! But, if you have been using the SAVE DOCUMENT Command faithfully, you can recover from such accidents, and what might have been a catastrophe, won't be. Thus, guard against loss of data by using the SAVE DOCUMENT command OFTEN.) At this time since you no longer need to work with the exercise document, you may end the split screen. Do this by first switching the cursor to the bottom window using the OTHER WINDOW Command (so that you may continue reading the instructions). Type: Control--X O (the letter 'o') Perfect Writer immediately switches the cursor to the bottom window. With the cursor in the bottom window, type the CREATE ONE WINDOW Command: Control---X 1 The window holding these instructions will become the only window on the screen. This concludes our lesson on `Revising Text: Deleting & Inserting'. So far in three lessons you have learned many of the basic commands that allow you to enter, edit, and print text with Perfect Writer. These are: Screen Commands: VIEW NEXT SCREEN PgDn Key VIEW PREVIOUS SCREEN PgUp Key Split-screen Commands: CREATE TWO WINDOW Control---X 2 CREATE ONE WINDOW Control---X 1 Switch to OTHER WINDOW Control---X O (the letter 'o') Other Window Screen Commands: VIEW NEXT SCREEN (Other Window) Control---PgDn VIEW PREVIOUS SCREEN (Other Window) Control---PgUp Inserting: OPEN INSERT `Ins' Key CLOSE INSERT Escape...Control--O ADJUST PARAGRAPH Escape. . .Q Deleting: DELETE PREVIOUS CHARACTER BACKSPACE Key DELETE NEXT CHARACTER Control---D DELETE NEXT WORD Escape. . .D DELETE LINE Control---K `Del' Key DELETE SENTENCE Escape. . .K DEFINE PARAGRAPH Escape. . .H SET MARK Escape. . . WIPE REGION Control---W YANKBACK Control---Y File Commands: READ DOCUMENT Command Control---X Control---R FIND DOCUMENT Command Control---X Control---F SAVE DOCUMENT Command Control---X Control---S Exiting: QUIT Command Control---X Control---C Transposition: TRANSPOSE CHARACTERS Control---T TRANSPOSE WORDS Escape....T Uppercase/Lowercase: UPPERCASE WORD Escape...U lowercase WORD Escape...L Capitalize WORD Escape...C As you review this list of commands, note how many of the command keys stand for the action they produce: 'R' for 'read', 'S' for 'Save', 'T' for 'transpose', `D' for `Delete', `Y' for 'yankback', etc. ESCAPE Key vs. CONTROL Key Also, note the general relationship that exists between the Escape and Control Keys. It is one which will help you learn and remember Perfect Writer's commands. We see it best illustrated here in the two deletion commands: DELETE NEXT CHARACTER Control----D DELETE NEW WORD Escape. . .D While the Escape Key is often used to perform the same kinds of operations as the Control Key, it generally operates on larger units. That is, if `Control--D' deletes the next CHARACTER, `Escape. . .D' deletes the next WORD. This relationship is found throughout Perfect Writer's command structure, and we will continue to point it out wherever possible. The few commands that you have learned will allow you to do a good deal of editing with Perfect Writer. However, Perfect Writer provides a host of other commands: for rapidly moving the cursor, searching, manipulating multiple files, copying and moving text, and other miscellaneous operations, all of which make editing with Perfect Writer a marvelous experience. In the lessons that follow we will be examining these. In the next lesson you will learn how to move about a document more quickly, jumping the cursor to the ends of a line, sentence, paragraph--even to the end of the document itself. If you wish at this time to continue on to Lesson # 3, which discusses Moving the Cursor, type the READ DOCUMENT Command: Control---X Control---R [ IMPORTANT: Perfect Writer may respond with the message: "Discard modifications you have made?" Answer: 'Yes' ! ] Perfect Writer will then display the message "File to read: ". Type the file name "b:lesson3", followed by a carriage return. Perfect Writer retrieves Lesson 3 from Lessons diskette in drive 'b' and displays it to the screen, ready for you to continue. If you do not wish to continue with the lessons, type the QUIT Command: Control--X Control---C [ IMPORTANT: Perfect Writer may respond with the message: "Ignore Changes This Session?". Answer: `y' for `Yes' !! ] Perfect Writer returns you to its Main Menu, from which you may exit to your operating system. End of Lesson # 2�